By Majid Al-Shabib

Riyadh-Mubasher: The Saudi Tadawul saw a slump in the real estate sector on Wednesday on the backdrop of announcing taxes on undeveloped land plots in urban areas, known as “white lands.” Some real estate stocks showed their worst performance since 2008 as they were pressured by sell-offs.

The sector’s declining stocks were led by Saudi Real Estate, which fell 21% in the last three sessions to record a loss of SAR 1.18 billion in capitalisation, the stock’s lowest level since 2008.

It was followed by Emaar E.C., which plunged 16.75% and lost SAR 2.3 billion of its market capitalisation.

Property developer Dar Al Arkan slumped 15.75% in the last three days to hit its lowest in 42 sessions.

Meanwhile, the market’s leading stock Jabal Omar fell 9.73% to SAR 74.92 to record its worst daily performance since June 2008.

The sector’s losses in the last three sessions exceeded SAR 18.7 billion, out of which 42.3% was controlled by Jabal Omar.

Makkah Construction stock saw SAR 2.4 billion in losses, or 13.2% of total losses.

Translated by Sayed Abdel Rahman